


Well-Dressed

by thedevilchicken



Category: GreedFall (Video Game)
Genre: F/M, Getting Together, Mid-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-12
Updated: 2020-01-12
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:22:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22218508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/pseuds/thedevilchicken
Summary: Kurt and de Sardet attend a formal party in San Matheus.
Relationships: Kurt/De Sardet (GreedFall), Kurt/Female De Sardet
Comments: 5
Kudos: 66
Collections: Happy Greedfall





	Well-Dressed

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kilaem](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kilaem/gifts).



She's really meant to wear a dress for official functions, like all the proper Congregation ladies do. She knows that, but she hasn't done since she was twelve years old. 

The last time, the boys her age at the party teased her; they pulled her hair and laughed because the dress was so tight that she just couldn't stop them, and when they ran away, she tried to run after them. She remembers standing on the dress's long hem and how she bloodied her nose when she tripped and went sprawling. And though Constantin caught them, and he made them apologise while she was streaming blood all down her pretty clothes, it absolutely wasn't the same as catching them herself. 

The next time, she borrowed some of Constantin's best clothes and said she wouldn't go to the ball unless she was allowed to wear them. The clothes didn't really fit her: Constantin was a little taller than she was, his shoulders a little broader and his arms a little longer, so the doublet hung on her frame rather like a sack. A gilded sack, but a sack nonetheless, so she didn't go down to the ball. But, a few weeks later, new clothes arrived. They fit her perfectly, and she'd never worn a dress again. 

She's meant to wear a dress for official functions, like all the proper Congregation ladies do, like Lady Morange does, and the few Thélème women at the party who aren't clergy or missionaries. She should be wearing a dress, but she's wearing a doublet with a line of shiny gold buttons that march up underneath her chin and leather boots that cover up her woollen stockings and meet her breeches at her knees. Like most of the men are, she's wearing her sword. And, for the first time in years, people actually look at her as if she's the odd one out for it. 

Back home in Sérène, no one looked at her strangely when she walked into a ball because her mother is the Princess de Sardet and, more importantly, her uncle is Prince of the Congregation; they take their cues from him, in spite of etiquette, and he was the one who ordered her new clothing. He didn't even blink at his niece wearing her doublet, so neither did they, and the boys never got away from her again. She remembers being grateful to him for that. 

Her uncle was the one who sent her to training with Constantin, too. It's perhaps not too unusual for women of the royal line to have some training, but it's not usually the same: Evelyn knows her mother is - _was_ , she supposes - quite handy with a dagger, for instance, but she never picked up a sword. But Evelyn trained with Constantin and Kurt, and there was no special treatment just because she was a girl, just like there wouldn't have been in the Coin Guard. She liked that. She still likes it. A woman can be just as successful as a man in the Congregation of Merchants, but woe betide her if she learns to fence or wears a pair of trousers to a ball. If they were in New Sérène and not San Matheus, Constantin wouldn't have cared at all. It seems like the only one who doesn't care in San Matheus is Kurt. 

Kurt's with her. Petrus is there, too, somewhere in the governor's palace doing who knows what, and it will likely turn out to be to Evelyn's benefit on one hand and to his own on the other. Aphra and Síora stayed behind in the Congregation embassy, mostly because relations between Thélème and Hikmet aren't precisely at the dizziest of heights and they all know Síora is quite likely to say something they would all quickly regret; Evelyn regrets leaving her behind, because on the whole she agrees with her, but she's there on her cousin's business and though it wouldn't be the first time a party she's attended has devolved into a fight, and chances are Constantin would just find it all hilarious, she does try to work on his behalf. And Vasco...well, Vasco is visiting the other Nauts down by the docks. He misses the sea, and Evelyn can't begrudge him that. 

So, Kurt's with her. He's at her side, where he has been all evening, hanging off just by her right shoulder like a good guardsman should, except he doesn't look much like a member of the Coin Guard now. Once the invitation from the governor had arrived, and Constantin had told her to take Kurt with her in response to it, she'd sent out for clothes for him just like her uncle had for her. She remembers handing them to him, out of her trunk that had been just a little heavier than normal along the way, and how he scrunched up his face like she'd just asked him to streak through the Inquisition's headquarters and shake his arse at Aloysius. That might have been a more entertaining evening than the party, she thinks, but at least this way she's seen him in the clothes. Even if, she thinks, she'd rather have liked to see him out of them, too. 

He's wearing a long coat that's a lot like the sort that Constantin prefers, with a neatly tied neckcloth and a high, stiff collar that he doesn't seem to like at all. They've both left their hats on a table in a room off the foyer, as customary, and he's wearing a sword but it's not actually his - his own, the one he usually wears slung over his back, is in his room in the embassy, and he has a rapier buckled at his waist. She knows he could use it if he needed to, but it's not exactly his preferred weapon. Still, awkward as he looks as the evening wears on, irritated as he looks as he tugs the neckcloth just a little looser, he does cut a rather dashing figure. She's always thought that, though, whether he's dressed up like a Congregation nobleman or in a Coin Guard tunic. It's just that over the past few months, since they've spoken more, since they've got to know each other, she's found herself thinking that he's rather more than dashing.

She's always found pleasantries tiring. It's an unfortunate thing, given her new role as legate, but it doesn't make it any less true that she prefers the long walks between the colonies and native villages to contracts and embassies and saying pretty words to the right people. She's maybe not bad at it, because Sir de Courcillon was always an excellent teacher, but that doesn't mean she likes it. In her own way, she's as uncomfortable there as Kurt is. She just hides it better, and they stand there side by side, drinks in hand, as they watch some of the others dancing. 

It's been a long time since she last danced, she thinks; she was probably twelve, in that too-long dress that she bloodied so badly that it would have been ruined even if she hadn't refused to wear another. She remembers dancing with her uncle, and with one of his advisors, and Sir de Courcillon, and one of the noblemen whose sons she was probably supposed to marry but then her sword-fighting, trousers-wearing ways had probably scared them off. She doesn't feel particularly sad about that, but she does sort of miss dancing. There's something about the rhythm of it that she likes, and the movement, knowing the steps, almost like fencing - she knows the goal of fencing is technically to win the fight, but she's always enjoyed the fight for its own sake, just like a dance. She smiles ruefully and finishes her drink and when she turns to set her cup down, or find someone with a tray to take it for her, Kurt is frowning. 

"Is something wrong?" he asks her. 

"Why do you ask?" she replies.

He shrugs. The heavy fabric of his coat shifts and he smooths it back down over his chest with a frown. 

"You looked like you were miles away," he says. "Then you looked sad."

"It's nothing much," she tells him. "I was just thinking about the last time I danced."

"In Sérène?"

She nods. "Yes. In the palace. I think I was twelve, or at least it was before we met."

"Don't people usually dance at these things?"

"Usually." 

"But not you?"

"People stopped asking me."

He frowns. "Why?"

"Well, I started dressing like this. It would probably look a little strange, don't you think?"

He looks out across the room, past the spectators with their glasses in their conversations to the people dancing to the light string music. It's pretty, Evelyn thinks, very traditional but very well played, and she supposes there are some traditions that don't need to be broken. Then Kurt looks back at her again. He takes a glance up and down, at the doublet and her boots and the sword at her hip, and although it's not the first time that he's looked at her that way, she thinks it might be the first time that he hasn't tried to hide it from her. It started happening back in Sérène, in the last days before they set sail, once they'd started working together, and he looked like he was as surprised about it as she was. Since they arrived on the island, it's happened more frequently. She likes it, though she supposes she knows she shouldn't. She likes how it makes her feel. 

"I think it would look fine," he says. Then he pauses. Then he holds out one hand. "Do you want to? Dance with me, I mean. It's been a long time, but I can probably still muddle through." 

She looks at him as her heart races. She looks at him and she can imagine it so easily: she can almost feel all the other guests' eyes watching them, and almost feel his hands touching hers as they move. She can almost feel the old familiar movements of it in her limbs, and she'd like to do it, she thinks, and damn them all for staring. But she's there to represent her country, and her governor, and that governor is her closest friend in all the world, and so she knows she won't do it. She thinks there's likely a list as long as her arm of all the things she's wanted to do but hasn't, even if she blurs the lines sometimes. She understands her duties, even if she knows Constantin would let her do precisely as it pleases her. She understands her duties, even if Kurt can't possibly be expected to. He just wants to do something nice for her, because he'd like to put a smile back on her face. He wants to do something nice for her, because the feelings he has for her have clearly changed since they came to the island. He's put himself out on a limb and even if she can't say yes to what he's asking, she wants to meet him out there on it.

"I have a better idea," she says, and smiles. "I think we've stayed long enough to be polite. Let's go back to the embassy." 

There's a small frown on his face when she says it that she'd like to smooth away with her fingertips, but he doesn't disagree about it being time to leave - she's positive he hates these things as much as she does, so that's something that they have in common. He goes with her as she says her goodbyes and her thank yous. And then, they pick up their hats and they leave together. 

It's just a short walk to the house through the darkened San Matheus streets and when they get there, the others have already retired for the night. When she takes his hand and she leads him upstairs, he smiles and frowns and lets her. When she leads him into her room then turns the key inside the lock, he lets her do that, too. 

"Will you dance with me, Kurt?" she asks him, and she holds out her hands. He nods and he takes them, and she steps in close. And she can't sing, not even just a little, not even a passable hum, but she doesn't have to try; once she's unbuttoned his coat and pushed it off over his shoulders, once she's whipped off his neckcloth and sent her doublet the same way, she sees he understands that the dance can wait. He looks like himself again, in shirtsleeves and not that heavy brocade, so when he presses his mouth to hers, when he sets his hands at her waist and he kisses her, it's easy to see that the dance itself doesn't matter at all. The important thing is that he asked her, and she wished she could say yes. 

They go to bed in a clumsy tumble of limbs and laughter that's nothing even close to dancing. They strip each other quickly, but then they take it slow.

She was meant to wear a dress tonight, but that doesn't matter to anyone she cares about. And now they're here together, breathless, skin on skin as he's inside her, she knows Kurt wants her just the way she is.


End file.
